Had one crafting day with friends…another one coming up. We’re gearing up for a November craft fair.

Day of crafting with friends.

Canning:

Made up another batch of mustard! Loving the smell and taste of this one! I used Stone Smoke Porter, yellow & brown mustard seed, apple cider vinegar, ground mustard, salt, pepper, allspice, nutmeg. I adapted two recipes I found (Homemade Beer and English Mustard)…it made up 10 4-oz jars. I plan on making a Cranberry Mustard too.

Spicy Beer Mustard

I was given a bag full of clipped lavender from my MIL’s garden earlier and dried it. Part of it is now in a big old canning jar of local Nevada honey with my own dried rosemary. I’ll be putting this into 4-oz canning jars in about two weeks after it’s been strained.

Lavender Rosemary Honey.

Ghost Hunting:

My sister has quite a few ghost hunting equipment and she booked the Miner’s Shack up in Gold Hill (just south of Virginia City on the Comstock). My niece, Hannah, and her friend Maddie, my sister and I all spent an afternoon in VC and the night in Gold Hill. That was fun! Definitely want to go up with them when they do the Washoe Club in VC.

Miner’s Shack, Gold Hill, NV

Yellow Jacket Mill

Fourth Ward School, Virginia City, Nevada

Fourth Ward School, Virginia City, Nevada

Bottle Tree.

I know my niece, Hannah, took a bunch of photographs, but I never see them…hint, hint…if you’re reading this, Ms. Hannah.

Hannah.

Mackay Mansion grounds.

Carnelian Bay, Lake Tahoe:

Took a Monday off so we could spend Sunday night up at Tahoe. Spent Sunday at one of the free public beaches and Monday morning we tried kayaking (waterman’s landing). So…I’m saving my money up for a sit-in kayak now. 🙂

Carnelian Bay from the Gar Woods pier.

Kayaking on Lake Tahoe.

Mergansers.

Truckee Trestle Tour:

We finally made it up to Truckee, CA for the Hobart Estates Trestle Tour! They’ll be having another one in October if you’re local! We toured the lumber railroads and mills.

Remains of a flat car near Hobart Mills.

Railroad maintenance shop, Hobart Mills.

Lumber railroad trestle remains.

More trestle remains.

Baseball Bingo:

How to have fun when your minor league team, the Reno Aces (Arizona Diamondbacks), is losing. Sorry guys for wishing one of you got beaned by the pitcher! 🙂

Since Opening Day game of the Reno Aces soldout before I could buy tickets, I bought tickets to Sunday’s day game…while it wasn’t a soldout crowd it was pretty dang close.

I haven’t been to a major league game in a long time. We used to always go to Dodger Stadium, and when we moved up here I’ve been to a few A’s games when the Twinkies came to town (we’d buy the cheap seats so I could harass Canseco and cheer Puckett)…SO I WAS VERY EXCITED for my first Minor League game!

The ballpark is absolutely BEAUTIFUL! They did a great job. There isn’t a parking garage for the ballpark so you have to park on the street or go to the casinos (which is probably what the casinos wanted anyhoo)…we got there at 11:30 am to find parking for the 1 pm game. We found parking about 3 blocks away, it was a short walk…and then we waited in line until a little bit after noon when they opened up the gates.

Free programs and a schedule magnet were given out at the gate. Never did make it into the Aces Shop…the lines were longer than the beer & hotdog line. Note…if you just want to grab a hotdog and not stand in line go over to the “Party” Corners…there is a hotdog stand. 🙂 Beers are $7 each…way too much, but if you don’t drink you can bring in unopened plastic bottles of water.

Also, if you are over in the General Admission grass berm…you can bring low beach chairs to sit on. But after being there on a day game…in the sun…with no shade until 4pm (on 3rd base side)…I’m never gonna sit over on the grass berm (no shade whatsoever). I had the 70 SPF on (and I don’t even like sunscreen all that much). THIRD BASE LINE IS THE PLACE TO BE!

We lost 4-5…but WHAT A THRILL OF A GAME! 11 Innings! Thanks Guys for a great afternoon. I already have my Fourth of July tickets. We’d like to get tickets for every team that comes to visit. Following are some pictures of the game and Archie…the team’s something or other…and the very cool singing baseball head that sings Take Me Out To The Ball Game during the 7th Inning Stretch (that was pretty funny).